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$3,000 Tata Nano Car Coming To US
walterbyrd writes "The Nano is currently powered by a 37 hp two-cylinder engine and lacks common safety features such as power steering, traction control and airbags. It was originally designed to compete in the Indian market against scooters and motorcycles. . . Along with added safety equipment, it's likely the car will get a larger, less polluting engine for export markets. Unfortunately, that means the price will increase, as well, possibly tripling by the time it goes on sale in the U.S.."
In 1990 the number of deaths per mile driven was 30 percent higher than it is now.
Just to be pedantic - in most situations, ABS will NOT decrease your stopping distance, in fact, by definition not locking your tires reduces friction and actually increases stopping distances. What ABS does do, is enable you to stear around objects, etc while slowing down - which you cannot do if your tires are locked.
Power steering is actually a safety hazard - if you engine fails you will quickly lose the ability to safely steer the vehicle - especially if you are applying the brakes.
I'm in my right mind and I have the answer to everything!
Smart cars are designed to make parking easy in European cities. That's it. That's the design goal. That's why they're as long as a normal car is wide.
I live in Spain. Most of the Smart Cars I see driving around here are company cars with logos on them. Sales reps, that sort of thing. Very few people buy them for themselves, they're way overpriced for what they are.
I've driven one and I wouldn't buy one even if they were cheaper. They drive OK but the suspension's awful for something that's supposed to be a city car.
No sig today...
So lift off the throttle a little for a moment, let the gap open up a bit, and resume your previous speed. It's not hard.
Inflation Calculator says "What cost $1666 in 1960 would cost $12476.90 in 2011."
What a load of nonsense. There are plenty of used cars to be had. According to Wikipedia, there are around 200 million passenger cars registered in the US. And that doesn't include the 8 million motorcycles and 40 million light trucks.
So, around 0.3% of them were destroyed, and you're gonna spout some conspiracy nonsense about evil Islamo-Commie Obama making it impossible for poor people to find used cars?
I don't know where you got that crap from, but you need to stop listening to that source. They're poisoning you with lies.
... there is no supply of used cars in reach of their serfs^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hpoor people's spending power.
I just did a quick search for used cars for under $3000, and found quite a few of them on the market within a 50 miles radius. (Like everything else, if you're in a more rural area, you have to travel further to find stuff.) I mean, there are reasonable objections to Cash for Clunkers (e.g. it costs too much), but yours doesn't seem to be based in reality.
I am officially gone from
Correct. Crash tests against fixed barriers (the standard test quoted by manufacturers), indicate good survivability.
However, crash tests against even mid-sized sedans indicate very poor results for a smart car:
http://www.iihs.org/news/rss/pr041409.html
Keep in mind that cars are typically manufactured to specifically perform well on the standardized barrier crash-test. It's similar to how CPU's are designed to specifically perform well on standardized benchmarks.
Damnit, I just used a computer analogy in a story about cars....somehow, that just...feels....wrong.....
You need to leave even more space. Two seconds behind the car in front of you. And if he is tail-gating, his two seconds; and if the car in front of him is tail-gating, another two seconds again. Once you leave that six seconds in front of you, not enough cars can pass you to fill the space, so you can easily keep a five or six second gap. Try it. Works for me, has for decades.